Intel bunnies

Intel first premiered their ad campaign featuring them in a tv commercial where in a microprocessor fabrication lab the technicians are wearing suits which they use in the dust-free environment. Suddenly a technician pops in a sleek new state-of-the-art Pentium II microchip and the computers come alive with music and videos, while the 'bunnies' start breakdancing in space suits.

Why are they called bunnies? It's the name of the ad, plus Intel's new models. Thus Intel's huge ad campaign began, including 2 tv spots for the Super bowl.

Why did the campaign cease? Apple created their own campaign which showed the bunnies on fire. "We apologize for toasting the Pentium II processor in public, but the chip inside every new Power Macintosh G3 is up to twice as fast." According to Photoshop and Byte benchmarks, this is true. Intel never ran their bunnies ad again. Many mac users found the ad hilarious, as it ran in print and on TV.

View Apple's ad at ftp://ra.apple.com/pub/whymac/toast.mov
and a description at http://applemuseum.bott.org/sections/ads.html

Bunny lore. Most RL bunnies are Black and Latino, who take a certain pride in 'dancing' through their work. (I'm sorry if I sound like an apologist for slavery here.) Many of them know ASL, and use it, or an adaptation thereof, because it's hard to hear over the incessant fans, etc. in a clean room. People also, thus swathed, also tend to lose all sense of 'personal space' or body taboo, and weirdly, end up touching each other a lot more than most people do in everyday situations.

Source: Rudy Rucker.